My post last week concerning a California High School's efforts with MADD to traumatize their students, drew quite a reaction from readers. The following is an update:

School Defends Drunken Driving Hoax

Oceanside, CA. AP, June 12 (article originally published by KGAN-TV CBS 2 Iowa) – School officials in Oceanside, California, are defending a scared-straight exercise that sent some El Camino High School students into hysterics.

One Monday last month, California Highway Patrol officers went to 20 classrooms and delivered the grim news that several students had been killed in drunken-driving car crashes over the weekend.

The news devastated Michelle de Gracia, who says she was nauseated and too stunned to cry. Others in her physics class were so upset that the teacher had to tell them it was all staged. Then they became angry. Michelle says says "they got the shock they wanted."

A 15-year-old student says, while she feels "betrayed" by her teachers and school administrators, she also feels that "if it saves one life, it's worth it." Others disagree. During assemblies after the hoax, some students held up posters reading "Death is real. Don't play with our emotions."

Camino High guidance counselor Lori Tauber says "we wanted them to be traumatized."

"We wanted them to be traumatized." One wonders where the MADDness is going next….

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well, i think they have now admitted on public record, with the quotes reported, that they did commit a violation here.
â€œWe wanted them to be traumatized.â€

Hey, why not put out a new report the Iran has just taken out the sears tower in chicago, in order to people so riled up about the possibility, we asked our president to go to war against Iran? A report like that can open up peoples eyes to the threat of an iranian attack on US soil. ( i am being sarcastic).

The strudents who feel they were subjected to intentional emotional distress should file a law suit.

The parents should vote out the school board in the next election.

This is a huge issue, especially if lawsuits are in the works, won, or settled.

The school board in this community should be voted out of office!

I am in NA AND HAVE NO TIES WHATSOEVER, just from a personb reading what happened, it is clear it was wrong. TAHERE IS A RIGHT WAY AND WRONG WAY TO DO THINGS, … THIS WAS WAS WRONG, AND I THINK UNLAWFUL, MAYBE EVEN TO THE EXTENT OF DCRIMINAL, BUT CERTAINLY ON THE CIVIL SIDE.

I’M SORRY THE TOWN MAY BE BARKRUPTED BY LAWSUITS, BUT THEY SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT THAT BEFORE INFLICTINMG INTENTIONAL EMOTIONAL DISTRESS ON TEEN AGERS.

(MADD and their affiliatesâ€™ tactics are starting to remind me of pro-lifers who kill doctors in the name of their cause.)

Isn’t that the truth. Lets see? My grandmother was killed with a friend when broadsided by a concrete truck when I was 14. They couldn’t even determine who might have been driving….Three years later I lost 2 brothers within 6 months(13 and 21). Both tragic. So what did I do…I dealt with it as best I could ,,but one thing I did not do was spend all my time trying to get everyone to experience my pain. I’m sorry for your loss to all you MADD members out there, but one thing is for sure.

Grow up! Get out of your denial stage or seek professional help. I did!

It seems the school and police officials weren’t treating the students as anything other than children. Students in the 50’s, 50’s and 70’s were told that drugs would turn them into psychotic individuals, only to find out that this didn’t happen. If kids are taught that drinking will kill everyone they know, and that doesn’t happen, it’ll only embolden them to drink and drive more. This is a huge misstep by the school officials here.